Eye drop murder trial: Interviews show Franklin woman admitting to giving victim Visine in the past

WAUKESHA, Wis. (CBS 58) -- “Once I put in two drops for her.”

On Friday, Nov. 3, the state played hours of footage showing interviews Jessy Kurczewski did with police after being arrested in July 2019. The Franklin woman is facing one count of first-degree homicide and two counts of theft for allegedly killing family friend Lynn Hernan with eye drops in Oct. 2018 and for allegedly stealing over $290,000 from her.

At first, she questions what the Waukesha County Sheriff's Dept. thinks her involvement with the Oct. 2018 death of family friend Lynn Hernan is.

"I'm really starting to think you guys think I did something, or I did something wrong, and if you knew Lynn, you'd know the way she was. I didn't do anything, and I can tell you that honestly," she said.

Once detectives reveal to Kurczewski that Hernan's cause of death was a fatal dose of tetrahydrozoline, the active ingredient in eye drops, she claims to know nothing about it.

"What is that?" she asked about tetrahydrozoline.

"Commonly known as eye drops," Waukesha County Detective Aaron Hoppe said.

Despite not bringing it up prior, Kurczewski, after being told eye drops killed Hernan, claims the 62-year-old was suicidal, buying guns and drinking Visine with vodka for an easy way out.

"She tried pills twice, and it wasn't working," she said about Hernan's alleged suicidal tendencies.

Getting emotional, she tells the detectives she was not on board with Hernan's desire to end her own life.

"I didn't want her to do it. I didn't want her to do it," she said.

She told detectives she was so against it that she did not give Hernan anything with eye drops.

"I didn't purposely ever mix anything for her. Never. Swear to God. I'm not lying. She put [eye drops] in her water once in a while and her vodka once in a while. She kept trying more different doses," she said.

When asked if her ex-boyfriend's claims of her being poisoned with tetrahydrozoline six months prior were true Kurczewski first said it was not her, but a friend who ingested them. Later, she admits to drinking half a bottle of eye drops to understand Hernan better, saying she questioned if the eye drops contributed to her death.

“I, to this day, always wondered if it was the Visine that killed her," she said.

Eventually, the now 39-year-old says she did give Hernan a drink with eye drops in it in the past, but not the day she died.

“Once I put in two drops for her," she said.

The state's final witness, Detective Hoppe, testified on Friday that even though Kurczewski told him that she did not give Hernan eye drops in Oct. 2018, her story later changed again.

Witness testimony resumes Monday.